Asks FD to mollify Daniel Oliver and assure him that CD asks "only for what I wd. give my life’s blood for".
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The Charles Darwin Collection
The Darwin Correspondence Project is publishing letters written by and to the naturalist Charles Darwin (1809–1882). Complete transcripts of letters are being made available through the Project’s website (www.darwinproject.ac.uk) after publication in the ongoing print edition of The Correspondence of Charles Darwin (Cambridge University Press 1985–). Metadata and summaries of all known letters (c. 15,000) appear in Ɛpsilon, and the full texts of available letters can also be searched, with links to the full texts.
Asks FD to mollify Daniel Oliver and assure him that CD asks "only for what I wd. give my life’s blood for".
JDH reports on Frank’s reading of his Dipsacus paper at the Royal Society. Huxley slept through much of it, but JDH is well pleased with it.
Does not think the pistil behaved as JC described, except by mere accident.
CD counters Thiselton-Dyer’s objection to protoplasmic filaments of Dipsacus protruding beyond cell-wall, as Frank’s paper claims, by citing white "blood cells passing through vessels".
Has received Moseley’s collection of photographs.
Discusses spider specimens.
Thanks GBE for his essay on the placenta [Sull’unità del tipo anatomico della placenta nei mammiferi e nell’umana specie (1877)].
Apologises for sending wrong Cross and self-fertilisation erratum. The error is on p. 191 (where "cross-seeds" appears, it should read "self-fertilised"). There is no error on p. 275.
Asks EH to make a small correction in his translation [of Cross and self-fertilisation].
Has read in the newspapers about the album of photographs of German scientists sent in tribute to CD. His name and photograph are missing only because he was not asked to participate. CC assures CD he is one of his ardent supporters.
Thanks for Orchids [2d ed.].
Does not feel his abstract of Cross and self-fertilisation [Am. J. Sci. 3d ser. 13 (1877): 125–41] was thorough enough.
Has heard of their sad bereavement last autumn [death of Amy, wife of Francis Darwin].
Baillière wishes to bring out a French translation of Coral reefs; CD requests their co-operation.
Leucosmia burnettiana is in all probability dimorphic. Thinks Gilia is truly heterostyled and Phlox subulata was, perhaps, once heterostyled. Has good evidence of heterostyly in 39 genera from 14 families.
Thanks MN for essay ["Die Congerien", Abh. Geol. Bundesanst. Wien 7 (1875)]. It is the best case CD has met, showing "direct influence of conditions of life on the organization". A. Hyatt has come to same conclusion: that closely similar forms may be derived from distinct lines of descent. CD did not emphasise in Origin the direct action of environment on modification of species; most of the best evidence has been observed since its publication.
Warm thanks for CC’s letter. CD needed no word from CC to be convinced of his high opinion.
Thanks for CHB’s essay [New observations on hay-fever (1877?)]. The calculation of the weight of pollen-grains is wonderful. Suggests he consult Cross and self-fertilisation, pp. 376, 405 for information on this subject.
Asks CD to publish in Nature JGFR’s observation that natives of Hainan have movable tail bones up to 4 cm long.
Enquiring about cleistogamic flowers of Oxalis.
As editor of the new journal, Kosmos, thanks CD for the permission he has granted Ernst Haeckel to publish with CD’s approval.
Cites his long support for evolution as exemplified by his book [Die botanische Systematik in ihrem Verhältniss zur Morphologie (1866)].
CD has many German supporters.
Discusses the cleistogamous flowers of Oxalis. Thinks they may not be truly cleistogamous but merely arrested or imperfectly developed normal flowers.
Asks when his waggonette will be finished.